When Dallas-based Pizza Patron opened its latest location in San Antonio in October 2008, the chain known as it its fast service pizza idea, or QSP. The restaurant has a drive-thru window and an out of doors menu board. Prospects order by talking right into a microphone, then drive just a few extra ft to a window to choose up their pizza. Andrew Gamm, director of brand name growth for the rising chain (which is approaching 100 items on the time of this writing), says the corporate needs to alter the way in which individuals purchase pizza. “Our aim is to ship drive-thru service that rivals the non-pizza QSR section,” he says.
Whereas drive-thrus are widespread amongst burger and different fast service eating places, few pizza operators supply clients the comfort of ordering pizza, then not having to go away their vehicles to choose it up. Pizza takes quarter-hour or longer to cook dinner, an period of time that drive-thru shoppers may not tolerate. They’re accustomed to filling their orders in two or three minutes.
Pizza Patron dealt with the pace of service problem by working with an organization to develop an oven that bakes a pie in 4 minutes. The restaurant additionally narrowed the drive-thru decisions to about 5 menu objects. “Quickness and effectivity supersede customization,” Gamm says.
For many different pizza operators, drive-thru means the client orders by telephone or on-line, then drives to the restaurant to choose up the meals at a window. That technique is one solution to encourage individuals to choose up their pizzas, as an alternative of getting the restaurant ship. “You may cut back bills by placing in a window,” says Mark Ulrey, proprietor of the six-unit Flyer’s Pizza & Subs in Columbus, Ohio. The lowered bills come from hiring fewer supply drivers, and presumably having decrease insurance coverage prices and different prices related to supply. 4 of the Flyer’s places supply drive-thru service, which accounts for about 35 p.c of these shops’ gross sales. “Most of that enterprise has been taken away from supply,” says Ulrey.
Moreover, he notes, there are bills related to drive-thru. The placement needs to be a standalone or an finish cap constructing. “These price a pair extra {dollars} per sq. foot,” he says. Two Flyer’s places are finish cap and two are standalone. There are different constructing necessities. The window needs to be large enough to accommodate an 18-inch pizza field. That’s bigger than a drive via window at a burger place. The work space close to the window must have its personal money register. The kitchen would possibly must be redesigned to place the staging space or the holding space nearer to the window.
There’s additionally expertise to alert employees {that a} automobile has pulled into the drive via space. That could possibly be a magnet system constructed into the pavement, much like sensors that set off a site visitors mild, or an ultrasonic detector that sends a excessive frequency sound after which detects when the sound bounces off a automobile.
Daren Haas is vp of promoting and new enterprise growth for HM Electronics (HME), a Poway, California-based firm that makes ultrasonic detectors and different drive-thru associated expertise equivalent to headsets and timers. He says new expertise will make it simpler for eating places to develop their drive-thru processes. “You will get an embedded RFID tag in your bank card or mobile phone so you possibly can faucet and go for fee, and there’s additionally mobile phone and on-line ordering that shops your preferences,” he explains.
Haas provides that, typically, some areas usually tend to see expanded drive-thru than others. “In Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and different open areas, it’s enormous. It’s nearly non existent in California due to zoning legal guidelines and actual property may be very costly.”
Some drive-thru places are low tech. Kim Trotta, whose husband opened Trotta’s Pizza and Drive-Via in Cincinnati in 1996, says Trotta’s is in a constructing that was a automobile wash. “A number of the drive-thrus listed below are in previous barns,” she says. “Ours may be very engaging.” The world has companies that promote donuts, quick meals, groceries, even beer and wine by drive-thru home windows.
Columbus, Ohio-based Donatos has 176 places. Spokesperson Tom Santor says greater than 70 p.c have drive-thru home windows, and in these places, drive-thru accounts for 15 to twenty p.c of gross sales. One problem is to teach clients concerning the drive-thru choice. “The largest factor is simply the nomenclature of it,” he says. “On the again of our menu, we’ve a phone icon and we seek advice from the call-ahead drive-thru window.” The knowledge is on the Donatos Website online too.
Ulrey says Flyer’s workers lets clients know they will decide up orders at a window. “You educate them,” he says. “On the telephone we are saying, ‘Is that this going to be pickup, supply or drive-thru?’ ” Junk mail items additionally point out the drive-thru. Gamm says opening the QSP entailed altering the mindset of Pizza Patron staff. Many have been used to clients calling, then ready for supply or arriving twenty minutes later. “Now an order is available in and the clock is operating,” he says. “You’ve a couple of minutes to get it performed.”
The chain plans to open extra QSP places. The subsequent one will probably be in a former Popeye’s Rooster location that has a drive-thru. Gamm says the brand new format provides the chain extra choices in web site choice. “We are able to get into actual property that wouldn’t work with our mannequin beforehand,” he says. “It’s solely going to get higher. We’re very optimistic about progress.” ?
Speak to the Signal ”
Drive-thru clients need to converse to somebody or one thing. That’s not as a result of they’ve a criticism, however as a result of they’re used to yelling right into a microphone to position an order. Sadly for these frequent customers of drive via quick meals, the pizza drive-thru is totally different. With pizza, “drive-thru” often means “name or order on-line, then decide up at a window.” There is no such thing as a microphone exterior.
“It’s a long run ongoing training,” says Tom Santor, spokesperson for Columbus, Ohio-based Donatos. “They drive up and ask, ‘Do I speak into this signal?’ ”
Kim Trotta, of the household owned Trotta’s Pizza and Drive-Via in Cincinnati, Ohio, says she has seen just a few individuals speak to the signage exterior the constructing, a former automobile wash. “Once you first proceed into the doorway of the drive-thru, there’s a small signal that claims our hours. It’s humorous … generally individuals speak into it. We allow them to speak into it, then we stroll over to them.”
Nora Caley is a contract author specializing in meals and enterprise subjects. She lives in Denver, Colorado